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By R. Addison

Boom, boom, boom, boom. The staccato beat rings out across the bush; the stamps are at work - slowly pulverizing gold-bearing ore for a patient, grizzled prospector. This is the State Battery near Marvel Loch - a tiny (capacity: 25 ton/day) gold plant operated by the Western Australian government. It is one of many such plants located in remote corners of Western Australia and the Northern Territory - miniature custom mills operated for the benefit of prospectors and small mine operators. These State Batteries, so called because they are operated by state governments and because the principal item of machinery in the plants are stamp batteries, are fascinating anachronisms: throwbacks to times long past, to a century ago, to the hard and heady existence of gold rush days.

Jan 1, 1986

By Bruce D. Hanson

A computer model capable of simulating the basic production system in a variety of underground mining methods has been developed at the Twin Cities Mining Research Center. This Bureau of Mines paper describes the simulation of the basic production system at the working face, which includes drilling, blasting, mucking, and roof bolting. The model is event-oriented; that is, the status of the system is updated at the occurrence of an event. All event or activity times, including failure and repair of equipment, are treated as stochastic variables. A location dimension, in addition to the time dimension, is used, allowing the simulation of multiple location systems. To aid the user in determining the efficiency of his system, the model provides several reports. An event or activity report gives the frequency of occurrence total active time, and cumulative delay statistics for each event. An equipment report delineates the availability and utilization of all equipment. A production report provides information on various performance measures such as tons produced and holes drilled. The cost report gives the cost of various elements in the system. Operating data from an actual mining situation were used in validating the model. In addition to the description of the model, examples of simulation experiments which were performed on a room-and-pillar mine system are given. Use of the model to determine methods for improving the efficiency of the system is discussed.

Jan 1, 1974

By W. C. Yates

Lack of visibility from large, open-pit haulage truck cabs has become a serious safety problem. Anaconda conducted a research program to develop a low cost system to alert haulage truck operators to small vehicles present in blind areas. Several systems were developed and tested. As open-pit haulage truck size has increased, so has the size of the blind areas. Mine utility vehicles, pickup trucks, and cars are concealed within these blind areas and become safety hazards. Figure 1 shows the typical blind areas of a 136 t (150-ton) haulage truck. The areas of greatest concern are at the rear center and front right corner of the truck. In these "no visibility" areas many small vehicles have been crushed by large haulage trucks at various mine sites. In most instances, the occupants escaped the vehicle before it was destroyed. But injuries and death have occurred. In most cases, the accidents were attributed to negligence or carelessness by the small vehicle driver. The limited visibility problem still exists, though, and a solution is needed. Initial Solution The usual plane mirror on the driver's side and the convex mirror on the right front of the haulage truck allow only limited rear visibility. The typical, right side convex mirror is generally small and difficult to locate at a glance. This convex mirror also presents an image that distorts distance perception. These mirrors are of¬ten broken and immediate replacement not demanded or made. The US Bureau of Mines, in a contract with M.B. Associates, San Ramon, CA, developed an improved visibility system. It consisted of a larger, left view mirror and unique, blind area viewer. The large 230 x 690 mm (9 x 27 in.) left mirror has a small convex spot mirror near the bottom. The entire unit can be quickly replaced if broken. The large size provides a full view of driver orientation features such as the rear tire and the top of the load bed. The right 300 x 410 mm (12 x 16 in.) mirror has a convex surface and is quite rugged. The 510 mm (20 in.) spherical radius presents the operator with some distance distortion, but objects in its view are easily seen. The "blind area viewer" consists of a modified fresnel lens that allows the driver to "look around the corner." Installation of three of these lenses on the front of each haulage truck is rec¬ommended for adequate blind area coverage. This system significantly increases an operator's field of view and allows viewing of objects within about 3 m (9.8 ft of the truck. Many open-pit mines are nor mounting on smaller vehicles a long whip with a flag and lamp or both. This increases vehicle visibility to haulage truck operators. The whip is permanently attached to the mine vehicle. It can also be magnetically attached to transient vehicles. The whip system. though, is inadequate for visibility in the critical rear and right front blind areas. Alternate Solutions All of these visibility aids as¬sume an attentive driver. In addi¬tion, areas such as the rear blinc, area are not covered. Based on the inadequacy of existing visibility systems, Anaconda made a com mitment to further the truck de¬tection technology. The best ap¬proach was considered to be ar active system. It would notify the haulage truck operator that an en¬croaching vehicle is present. Sev¬eral systems were considered, in¬cluding ultrasonics and elec¬tromagnetics. For the ultrasonic system, com mercial and in-house design were looked at. Designing an( building transducers with the spe cific beam shape to match the haulage truck blind spots re¬quired a major technological breakthrough. False alarms ap¬peared difficult to prevent en¬tirely. They were caused by pass¬ing, trailing, or leading vehicles a., well as nonthreatening objects. As a result of these problems, the ul¬trasonic technique was not pur sued. An alternative, an electro

Jan 7, 1982

By A. A. El-Midany, R. M. Farag, A. M. Salem, S. E. El-Mofty

Bentonite is one of the main players in the stability of drilling mud. Its particle size and particle size distribution significantly affect drilling mud’s rheological properties. Although the Specifications for Drilling Fluids Materials report on Oil Companies Material Association (OCMA)-grade bentonite states that the API recommended powder having 2.5 percent mass fraction as the maximum value of residue of diameter greater than 75 μm, there is no other information on the specific size distribution for API bentonite. It was found that API bentonite has a specific size distribution with specific mixing weights. It is important to investigate why that mixture represents the optimum properties of drilling mud and how each individual size fraction has a specific function in the mixture. To clarify the effect of individual size as well as the collective effect of the size distribution, API bentonite was classified into different size fractions, with each tested separately for controlling properties such as filtration loss, plastic viscosity, gel strength, cake thickness and packing density.

By Victoria Vaccarezza, Corby Anderson

Due to the demand for rare earth elements for everyday technology and applications, there has been much research initiation into the extraction and recovery of rare earth elements. An otherwise unknown mineral, eudialyte is a zircon silicate consisting of rare earth oxides, specifically the heavy REO yttrium (III), with only trace amounts of thorium and uranium. The first part of this project aimed at finding an efficient way to liberate and upgrade eudialyte to concentrate the REO content. A combination of gravity and magnetic separation techniques were employed, resulting in limited success. The second part looked at the hydrometallurgical processing of eudialyte through various leaching experiments with sulfuric acid. In all, this project will discuss why certain processes were utilized over others, as well as the difficulties that arose during processing.

Mar 1, 2018

By G. H. Li

Preparation strontium carbonate with celestite concentrate by flotation is studied by agglomeration-reduction roasting process. It is shown that, the drop strength of green pellet is greater than 4 times?(0.5m) -1 under the balling conditions of moisture of 9% and time of 18~20min. Lignin xanthate obviously improves the ballability of the celestite concentrate due to the increase of surface hydrophilicity, therefore, the balling rate is increased, as well as green ball strength. The drop strength of 7 times?(0.5m) -1 can be obtained when the lignin xanthate dosage is 0.5%~1%. Reduction roasting with anthracite shows that the SrSO4 conversion is 82%~83% for celestite concentrate pellet, under the optimal conditions of roasting temperature of 1100~1150? and time of 30min, and it is 10% higher than conversion of celestite lump under the same conditions. The strontium carbonate are prepared after roasted pellets are leached, purified and carbonated, and the SrCO3 content is higher than 97% , while the content of CaCO3 is less than 0.3%.

Jan 1, 2014

By Alexandre Silva Guimarães

Este trabalho avaliou a purificação de níquel em relação aos contaminantes cálcio e magnésio a partir de soluções sintéticas sulfúricas simulando os licores industriais obtidos pelo processo de lixiviação sob pressão de minérios lateríticos de níquel. O uso de Cyanex 272 (20% v/v) se mostrou ineficiente na purificação do licor em decorrência das extrações simultâneas de magnésio e níquel e pela baixa seletividade do Cyanex 272 em relação ao cálcio (extrações inferiores a 10%). A adição de 5% v/v de ácido naftênico ao Cyanex 272 (20% v/v) provocou a extração conjunta de magnésio e níquel e extrações insignificantes de cálcio (inferiores a 0,5%). A mistura de 20% v/v de Cyanex 272 com 20% v/v de D2EHPA, em pH = 4,5, é passível de promover a purificação do licor frente ao níquel, pelo fato desta combinação de reagentes extrair cerca de 50% de cálcio, 48% de magnésio com baixos teores de níquel (em torno de 10%), podendo-se utilizar dois estágios de contactação para se obter no mínimo 80% de níquel purificado em fase aquosa.

Aug 7, 2018

By Yihan Liu, Jintao Zhang, Chen Xiao, Xiaomeng Zhao, Guanglei Song

To estimate the performance of the inert anode materials based on NiFe2O4 spinel ceramic during it used for aluminum electrolysis, we investigated the wetting process of cryolite molten salt which is in composition of industrial aluminum electrolysis with carbon anode and NiFe2O4 based cermet materials, by means of determination the interface wetting angle between the molten cryolite electrolyte and the solid anodes interface. The results show that the wetting angle between the electrolyte and carbon anode is larger than 90 angulation, this means that they basically can not wetting; however the nickel ferrate spinel ceramics behaves much better. In regard to the NiFe2O4 matrix materials, their initial wetting angles is 76.9. The initial wetting angles for 1.0wt%MnO2, 2.5wt%TiO2 and 0.5wt%V2O5-doped samples are respectively 56.86°, 52.98° and 51.93°. However, after 50s later, all the wetting angles came down below 15°.

Jan 1, 2015

By Andrey de Moraes Barcelos Casanova, Rebeca Vieira de Oliveira, Juliana Diniz e Castro, Danilo Abílio Corrêa Gonçalves, Patricia Freitas Rodrigues, Thiago Henrique Fernandes Dias Ferrão, Naiara Vieira Le Sénéchal, Rodolfo da Silva Teixeira, Andersan dos Santos Paula

Este trabalho avaliou a efetividade do tratamento térmico de solubilização de uma liga de NiTi com 58,5%at. Ni comparado a uma liga de composição equiatômica, elaboradas por vacuum arc remelting (VAR). A solubilização foi realizada à 950 °C, em forno de atmosfera não controlada, com tempo de encharque de 2 h, seguido de resfriamento rápido em água à temperatura ambiente. Foram analisadas imagens de microscopia óptica e de microscopia eletrônica de varredura, após preparação metalográfica, das amostras fundidas e solubilizadas, bem como, quantificação da segunda fase pela análise de micrografias ópticas. As propriedades mecânicas foram avaliadas pelo ensaio de dureza por microindentação Vickers. O tratamento térmico imposto resultou em alterações morfológicas na liga equiatômica e não foi possível verificar a dissolução completa dos precipitados da liga com elevado teor de Ni. Foi observado a diminuição da dureza com a solubilização do NiTi equiatômico, e aumento na liga Ni58,5%at.-Ti41,5%at.. Logo, para se obter uma solubilização ótima das ligas, se faz necessário um tempo de encharque maior.

Oct 22, 2019

By M. M. O?Brien

THE SULLIVAN MINE The Sullivan mine of the Consolidated Mining and ? Smelting Company of Canada, Limited, is situated at Kimberley, B.C., nineteen miles from Cranbrook, a divisional point on the Crowsnest Pass branch of the Canadian Pacific railway. Production started on a small scale in 1900, and in 1914 the mine became the largest lead producer in Canada. In 1925 it was the largest single producer of lead and zinc in the world. Since operations commenced, 4,800,000 tons of ore have been produced from stopes and 170,000 tons from development. At the present time, ore is being mined at the rate of 1,100,000 tons per year, with a yield of about 200,000 lb. lead, 110,000 lb. zinc, and 4,000,000 oz. silver. The town of Kimberley is easily accessible by road as well as by rail. The altitude at Mark creek, a tributary of the St. Mary's river, is 3,700 feet. To th'e north of the creek, Sullivan hill rises to a height of 6,100 feet, and it is on the southern slope of this hill that the mine is located. Sullivan hill is in the Purcell range, which rises between the Rocky Mountain trench on the east and Kootenay lake on the west. It thus lies within what is commonly referred to as the East Kootenay district.

Jan 1, 1926

By G. D. Markland

The Moose Mountain mine is located in a belt of Precambrian volcanic rocks situated 20 miles north of Sudbury, Ontario. It was the first iron mining operation in the Archean iron-formations of the Canadian Shield. The ore is believed to have been formed in an environment of active volcanism, being part of a pyroclastic and volcanic series where only the iron-formation and chert qualify as chemical sediments. The volcanic environment, subsequent regional tectonics and metamorphism produced orebodies which differ from the main sedimentary iron ranges of the world in such features as continuity, grade, structure and metallurgical characteristics. The orebodies occur as relatively small lenses which have been complexly folded, faulted and intruded by acidic and basic dykes.

Feb 1, 1966

By G. D. Markland

"The Moose Mountain mine is located in a belt of Precambrian volcanic rocks situated 20 miles north of Sudbury, Ontario. It was the first iron mining operation in the Archean iron-formations of the Canadian Shield.The ore is believed to have been formed in an environment of active volcanism, being part of a pyroclastic and volcanic series where only the iron-formation and chert qualify as chemical sediments. The volcanic environment, subsequent regional tectonics and metamorphism produced orebodies which differ from the main sedimentary iron ranges of the world in such features as continuity, grade, structure and metallurgical characteristics. The orebodies occur as relatively small lenses which have been complexly folded, faulted and intruded by acidic and basic dykesAlthough the basic mining and beneficiation methods are simple, detailed geological control in exploration, planning and operation has been necessary to apply detailed selective techniques to the large-scale open-pit methods necessary in profitable iron mining.The milling and pelletizing processes are sensitive to minor variations in ore grade, grain size, fabric and mineralogy. Although detailed correlations of geological information and mill performance are still not entirely satisfactory, general working relationships have been determined with simple testing procedures. These are of in-creasing use in forecasting production and in ore-blending processes.The application of geology to mining and milling operations at Moose Mountain represents a departure from general practice in iron ore operations."

Jan 1, 1966

By Monica Pavlik, Thomas Wildeman

Water from the Forest Queen mine adit near Silverton, Colorado drains into a natural wetland. Because the pH of the water averages 5 and the iron concentration averages 18 mg/L, it was thought that the wetland might naturally treat the water. Of most concern with respect to the aquatic environment is zinc whose concentration averages 0.60 mg/L. Starting in October 1997, the surface waters, ground waters in the peat substrate, and the sediments in the wetland were sampled and analyzed four times over the course of four months. The adit water primarily remains as surface water where Fe, minor amounts of Al, and no Zn are removed. After the adit water enters the peat, then it is found that the pH rises to 5.8-6.5 and sulfate is reduced. The removal of Zn and A1 is caused by these two changes. However, Fe in its reduced state is quite soluble and may be remobilized in the reduced environment of the peat.

Jan 1, 2000

By Art Hamilton

The Zn-Pb-Cu-Ag ore deposits of the Boundary and N-5 zones near Bathurst, New Brunswick, occur in a polydeforrned volcano-sedimentary sequence that is part of the Ordovician Tetagouche Group. Massive and disseminated sulfides are hosted by an argillaceous to cherty sedimentary sequence that is stratigraphically Wlderlain by a siliceous fragmental unit and is overlain by a feldspar-rich crystal tuff and related tuffaceous rocks. The deposits have a low iron sulfide content relative to that of most stratabound sulfide deposits of the Bathurst-Newcastle mining district. The ore is commonly associated with chlorite- and talc-rich sediments. The N-5 deposit is considered to be the fault-displaced extension of the Boundary deposit. The Boundary deposit is estimated to contain 891 000 t grading 3.31% Pb, 7.96% Zn, 0.32% Cu and 44 g/t Ag; the estimate for the N-5 zone is 330 000 t grading 3.24% Pb, 7.15% Zn, 0.33% Cu, and 37 g/t Ag. The ore is processed at 1000 tpd at the Heath Steele mill.

Jan 1, 1992

By Charles E. Heinrichs

There arc still ample reserves of phosphate in Florida and Tennessee, but the richest low-cost areas have been exhausted. The miners, by the introduction of more efficient equipment, have succeeded in preventing material increases in production costs. Further mechanical improvements could not be expected to keep up with the factors tending to increase costs. While the conventional phosphate "washers" are capable of recovering practically all of the plus 1.5-mm. phosphate from the matrix, approximately 50 per cent of the phosphate values are in the minus 1.5-mm. sizes. Flotation now affords an economical and efficient means for recovering the fine ( — 1.5 mm.) phosphate formerly discarded to waste dumps. Through the reclamation of dumps and recovery from current washer wastes, flotation has doubled the reserves of Florida and Tennessee. By doubling recoveries from the matrix, flotation reduces capital investment requirement and substantially reduces production costs. It definitely improves the grade of the total production and provides a flexibility of operation that cannot be obtained by any other known means.

Jan 1, 1934

By P. V. Barr, Y. -H. Li, A. P. Watkinson

Subsequent to a campaign of pilot-kiln trials of firing bio-oil and natural gas, scale-up to commercial lime kilns was made using an in-house mathematical kiln model. Both dry limestone and lime mud kilns of 3.5 m OD. by 100 m length were used for bio¬oil firing simulations. Comparisons were made against natural gas firing on the basis of specific firing rate, off-gas volume, energy consumption and overall lime quality. Model simulation results indicate that conversion from natural gas to bio-oil with no productivity loss will increase energy comsumption by about 7.5% and total off-gas volume by about 8%. Alternatively, a 6% decrease in productivity would be expected if off-gas volume is maintained constant. The calculations are sensitive to deviations in the lower heating value (LHV) used in the simulations. A 5% increase in the LHV of the bio-oil, which could result from a 3% decrease in the moisture content, reduces the energy penalty to 2% coupled with a slight reduction in off-gas volume.

Jan 1, 2004

By William B. Plank

Mineral engineering student enrollment in U. S. and Canadian schools for 1955-1956 is 11,408, an increase of 11 pct more than last year. The undergraduate and graduate engineering students in both countries number 251,765, or 13 pct more than last year. These figures have been released by the American Society for Engineering Education. The largest increase in the undergraduate mineral engineering group in the U. S. is in ceramic engineering, with 676 students, or 31 pct more than last year. The next largest increase is in mining which shows a gain of 13.5 pct, compared with a gain of 13.1 pct in the total undergraduate enrollment in all engineering schools approved by the Engineers' Council for Professional Development. This figure is 190,355, which approaches the prewar figure. Metallurgical undergraduates increased 13 pct; geological, 5 pct; and petroleum, 2.5 pct. This year the figures for geophysics are combined with those for geological engineering, making a total of 1610 undergraduates, of which the geophysicists comprise about one seventh.

Apr 1, 1956

By D. S. Bird

Kennecott Utah Copper began a modernization program in 1986 that was aimed at expanding and updating mining and ore process facilities at the company’s Bingham Canyon copper mine and concentrator near Salt Lake City, UT. Major components of the project included installation of an in-pit crusher, a transfer conveying system and a new ore concentrator with a design capacity of 70 kt/d (77,000 stpd). The Copperton concentrator was commissioned in February 1988. The grinding circuit is one of its principal features. It consists of three identical lines, each with a 10.4-m- (34-ft-) diam x 4.6-m- (15-ft-) long semiautogenous grinding (SAG) mill and two 5.5-m- (18-ft-) diam x 8.6- (28-ft-) long ball mills. The SAG mills are driven by two 4.5-MW (each) (6000-hp) variable- speed dc motors through a clutch-pinion gear-ring gear assembly. The ball mills are driven by 4.1-MW (5500-hp) synchronous motors coupled through a typical clutch-pinion gear-ring gear system.

Jan 1, 1995

By Julian V. Simela

Conventional methods of underground surveying use theodolites/total stations and 3D laser scanners to obtain information about the underground environment. Current methods of geo-referencing these instruments to a mine reference system include triangulation, trilateration and resection. However, despite technological advancements, surveying procedures have remained slow, laborious and relatively unchanged during the last half-century. Recent innovations in the robotics community have shown that automated mapping of underground mining tunnels can be undertaken using 2D/3D laser scanners. These techniques have the potential to, in turn, improve upon current underground surveying and mapping methods. Automating surveying and mapping using current surveying tools without changing the setting up procedures or removing current constraints, or even changing the type of equipment used, does not change the status quo. The problem of moving from a static, tripod based surveying and mapping system to an unconstrained mobile surveying and mapping system is the subject of this paper. A current challenge for automated mapping is the ability to automatically geo-reference a mobile mapping system to a mine reference system. For a mobile mapping system that uses a horizontally mounted 2D laser scanner to gather data of the underground environment, the challenge of determining its position and orientation within the mine environment is magnified even more. This paper introduces Mobile Automated Scanner Triangulateration (MAST), a technique under development at Queen?s that is designed to geo-reference a mobile mapping system to a mine reference system for the purposes of underground mine surveying. MAST quickly and automatically determines scanner 2D position and orientation (azimuth) in a mine reference frame by using minimal human input.

Aug 1, 2013

By Monge G. Enrique O.

"El presente trabajo describe el proceso, elementos y las pruebas correspondientes para el diseño de plantas de tratamiento del carbón en el Perú. La construcción del diseño de plantas de tratamiento de carbón contiene cuatro soportes: las pruebas de laboratorio, especificaciones generales, planos topográficos e información económica, las cuales legitimizan su avance estructural y mejoran el producto minero. Así también su construcción requiere de cierto conocimiento íntimo del material, de las maquinarias y los procesos a emplearse. Un plano de diseño parece un acertijo en las que las unidades se aglomeran y los transportadores, elevadores, chutes, tuberías y cables forman una imagen extraña y un tanto artística. La función de este diseño de tratamiento busca contener el organismo, llenar la función y permitir la vigilancia, reparación y mantenimiento de las unidades, evitando cualquier exceso de espacio pues sería perjudicial y antieconómico. "

Jul 20, 1956